Learning No Flop Pineapple

The game of No Flop Pineapple Hold’em made its debut in 2011 in Las Vegas. The players that tried it out at the first tables really seemed to enjoy it so the game garnered a lot of popularity over the years since then.

Rules

The game uses a regular 52-card deck.

The standard poker rules will be used when trying to compare two hands. Here is the list of hand ranks in descending-rank order.

Four of a Kind

Straight Flush

Straight

Flush

Three of a Kind

Two Pairs

Pair

High Card Hand

To start things off the player will have to place an Ante wager. Now is the moment where he also has the option of placing a wager on the Pocket Pairs side bet.

Both the players and the dealer will be dealt three face down cards. Two community cards will also be placed face down on the table.

All of the players will now examine these three cards and decide which two cards they will keep and which card they want to discard.

When all of the players have discarded one card the first community card will be revealed. All of the players will now have to decide whether to fold and lose their Ante or make a Play bet of 2x the Ante and continue the game.

At this moment the dealer will reveal the other community card and his three hole cards. He will then have to discard one of his cards to make the best possible four-card hand.

Now the dealer has to compare his hand to each of the player’s hands.

If the dealer has a better hand than the player, the player will lose his Ante and Play bets.

If the player has a better hand than the player he will win even money on his Ante and Play bets.

If the hands are tied both the Ante and Play bets will be pushed.

In case that the player has a flush or better, the player will get an Ante Bonus no matter the outcome of the game. This is the pay table for this Ante Bonus:

Four of a Kind: 40 to 1

Straight Flush: 20 to 1

Straight: 2 to 1

Flush: 1 to 1

Discard Strategy

Three of a Kind: Discard any card you want.

Pair: Discard the singleton.

Three suited cards: Here you should discard the lowest card.

Three singletons, three different suits: Discard the lowest card.

Three singletons, two highest suited: Discard the lowest card.

Three singletons, lowest two suited: Generally you should keep the highest two cards.

Three singletons, highest and lowest suited: The higher that the middle card is, the more likely it is that the player should keep it.

If you follow this strategy as much as possible you will have a good time at the tables playing this game. The house edge of this game is around 3.53% so you should be very careful when wagering a lot on this game because the odds are better for the house.